Skeletons in the Closet
by zned51
Summary: Years after his assignment in Spain, Leon finds himself living the mundane life of a small town police chief. Wanting nothing more than to forget his past, Leon soon realizes that skeletons left too long in the closet tend to make a lot of noise...
1. Chapter 1: A Blast from the Past

He awoke from the dream, paralyzed with fear; sweat gluing the sheets to his body

He awoke from the dream, paralyzed with fear; sweat gluing the sheets to his body. Reflexively, his hand fell to the grip of the pistol on his nightstand. Sweeping the firearm and a storm of small debris off the wooden piece of furniture, he sat up swiftly, playing the barrel of the pistol across the room. Assured that he was alone, he cleared the weapon and then reloaded it. Re-chambering the same round over and over was asking for a catastrophic failure of the weapon, but at this point Leon no longer cared. Sighing, he put his hands to his head and closed his eyes. The cold steel of the pistol's slide felt good against his almost fevered forehead. Throwing the twisted sheets off of his body, he got to his feet and strode across his room to open the window. The night wind whipped the drapes into fleeting forms vaguely reminiscent of elusive ghosts, playing serpentine fingers across his cheeks. The wind brought with it the scent of trees – pine and maple. He exhaled, letting all of his anxiety bleed away into the night with the last traces of his breaths. Turning away from the window, he glanced at the digital clock on the dresser by the door. Four past midnight. Not bad. He'd managed to pick up a few hours of unbroken sleep for once. Leon was forced to squint after he flicked on the light switch – bright fluorescent light flooded his room, revealing a habitat so "squared away" that even the most hard assed drill instructor wouldn't be able to find fault with it. That is, of course, if they overlooked the mess of a bed and the mess on the floor. Leon kneeled and began gathering the spilled medications and prescriptions that had fallen from the nightstand when he had grabbed his pistol.

The day became a series of routines. Turn down the bed. Late night television. Mile run at the stroke of six. Cook breakfast. Eat. Shower. Dress and make ready for work. Every day was an exercise in repetition. Leon wondered if it would ever end. As he shut and locked the door to his apartment, he had a funny feeling that today would be the day that somehow brought an end to the meaningless practice that his life had become.

The door to Mount Forest's sheriff department announced its opening with a homely tinkling of bells. The receptionist and dispatcher, a petite brunette named Chelsea, welcomed him with a warm smile as the door shut behind him.

"Mornin' chief, you're early for once."

Leon smiled at the almost traditional greeting.

"So are you."

The two had been fast friends since Leon had first started work as an officer in the small town of Mount Forest. Both of them often showed up before their shifts started and relieved the people on call an hour or two before they were supposed to.

Chelsea rose and handed him a cup of steaming black coffee.

"Just the way you like it. Black with a few sugars."

"A few? Should I be worried about my blood sugar levels?" The hints of a smile played at the corner of Leon's mouth.

Chelsea cast an approving glance over him.

"No way. Not with your body."

Leon laughed, and thanked her for the coffee as he made his way into "The Trench". The sign above the door was lovingly affixed to the spot between the roof and the top of the door jamb. Duct tape and masking tape held it in place. It was made of cardboard and poorly cut out red construction paper letters. A signature so small you would've needed a magnifying glass to see it read "Nolan". Leon smiled to himself and reached up to give the sign a pat before heading to his office.

Passing by several cubicles, he noticed that one of them was occupied. Sighing, he walked over and was not surprised to fine one of his deputies asleep at his desk. Nolan Rogers, five feet and ten inches of childish pranks and practical jokes, lay dead to the world in his cubicle. Placing his coffee in the adjoining cubicle and rummaging through one of the drawers in Nolan's filing cabinet, Leon extracted an air horn. He braced himself, and let off one quick blast from the toy. Nolan exploded into action, leaping up and flailing.

"Huh – wazzat!? The fu- Oh. Sir."

From the reception area, Leon heard a peal of laughter.

"You can go home, Nolan. I'll hold the fort for awhile. And do something about that sign sometime, will you?"

Nolan grinned, his creased face falling easily into the laugh lines that were a permanent part of his visage. He ran a hand through his short black hair and snapped a mock salute in respect of the "order".  
"No way sir. The trenches are where people worked and gave their lives back in the world wars. We're doin' the same thing here – just not on such a grand scale, y'know?"

Leon picked up his coffee and spoke over his shoulder before closing the door to his office.

"If you say so."

The local newspaper, the Mount Forest Gazette, was waiting for him on his desk. As Leon picked it up, something fell out and landed on his desk. A disc complete with clear case. Someone had scrawled "PLAY ME" in large block letters across the front. Leon remembered the last time Nolan had suckered him with one of those. He had burned some kind of "optical illusion" onto a disc, and then pulled the same gag. It had ended up being a prank, where after placing his nose an inch from the screen, a picture had popped up… accompanied by one hell of a scream coming from the speakers that Nolan had secretly turned up. Leon had just about pissed himself and nearly managed to ruin a good pair of pants by spilling coffee all over them. Nolan thought it was hilarious, and Leon had to admit, that in retrospect, it was pretty funny. Smiling, he placed the disk to the side of his desk and opened the newspaper.

The usual small town gossip and scandal was quickly passed over in favour of the editorial section. Particularly, the section written by that attention craving harlot, Madison Scherer. In the past few months she had done nothing but criticize Leon and the entire sheriff's department. Phrases such as "Money wasting ineffective jokes of law enforcement officers" often abounded in her articles. Today's article was perhaps the most shocking yet. Leon came out of his chair directly onto his feet, the pages in danger of ripping, so tight was the hold he had on them.

"Chels!" he called, "Call Nolan back in. He's still got another hour or so of time to be here. If you can't reach him, call Mike up and ask him if he can fill in for awhile. Beg if you have to."

Her reply came back muted through two doors and fifty feet of air.

"Affirmative, but why?"

"I have something I need to take care of…"

The home of Madison Scherer was modest and blended perfectly with the suburban neighbourhood it inhabited. Such was the mark of a good snoop. Madison's house had no lawn ornaments to set it apart from any other. There was no intricate landscaping; no uniquely crafted window shutters; not even a slightly different paint job to set it apart from the neighbouring houses. A person could look right at it and keep on looking. Madison Scherer was an expert at blending in.

Early morning tranquility and calm was lost on Leon Scott Kennedy. He had to restrain himself from kicking in her front door, and instead resolved to pound on it until his hand went numb. Upon which, he used his other hand. He heard half a dozen bolts being drawn back, and a voice that oozed like honey calling "Coming, hold on please!"

When the door opened, Madison's face changed from a fawning smile to a barely concealed frown.

"Oh, it's you. How surprising. I wasn't expecting to see you until around after noon, Mr. Kennedy. Or should I say, Special Agent Kennedy?" A sickening smile had appeared on her face as she spoke the last few words.

"How did you find out? Who told you? Where'd –"

"One question at a time please, Mr. Kennedy. If you'd like, I'll make it easy for you and just say this. A little bird in red told me."

Leon froze.

_Ada?_ his mind whirled, as the possibilities of that one sentence bounced around in his head.

"What do you mean, a little bird in red?"

"I can't say much; that was one of her conditions. I can tell you however, that she was quite the _noble type_."

Leon did not miss the obvious hint, though he didn't understand it. He changed tack.

"Get that story off the press. Now!"  
"Can't," she replied airily, waving a hand in dismissal, "Already in print. If you'd like, you can try and hit every convenience store and paper boy in town… but I don't need to tell you that you'd be wasting your time."

Leon was incredulous. All these years he'd managed to keep the past behind him, and now, because of this… this bitch, he'd have to pick up and start over again.

"I'm going to sue you."

"You won't."

He realized that she was right. She had only written enough to implicate him in the barest of ways. The whole story had come just short of flat out accusing him of being a government agent tucked away in some backwater county – to lessen the damage he could cause. The problem wasn't that it was true. The problem was that he had been hoping that _that_ part of his life was behind him – he had _believed_ it was behind him. His life here was still salvageable. If she wrote any more… the quaint little existence he had built for himself in this town would come crashing down around him.

What he was about to do caused him to grit his teeth and swallow every last bit of pride in his body.

"Don't print any more. That's best for me, and definitely for you. Please…?"

"Threats of violence?" She gave a wry laugh. "You don't have to ask. That was another condition set forth. But I'm so _glad_ you did."

Leon spun on his heel and walked away from the door, the reporter's light laughter haunting each of his steps like a dog snapping at his heels.

Back in the squad car, Leon sat fuming for a moment before turning the key in the ignition. As the engine of the cruiser rumbled to life, a squawk burst from the scanner followed by Chelsea's voice.

" – nedy, do you read? Come in, Sheriff Kennedy."

Leon hesitated only a moment before hitting the response key.

"Dispatch, this is Kennedy, go ahead, over."

The relief in Chelsea's voice was immediately apparent.

"Just in time, chief. I was about to wake up Nolan and ask him to cruise the streets looking for you."  
"Chels, if this is about that newspaper artic-"

"Don't sweat it chief, I read it before you came in this morning. You're Leon to me, always have been and always will be. Who you _might_ have been before and who you are now… those are different things."

Leon slumped in his seat with relief. He hadn't realized how much he had come to love this little town and the people in it. It felt good to know that some people wouldn't care about whether or not he had been a government agent.

"Thanks Chels… that means a lo-"

"Would you shut it for a minute, chief? Mike's got a situation and he needs assistance. Like, five minutes ago."

Leon's cop mode kicked in, and he swung the car into the street.

"What happened?"

"Something big. Homicide, chief. Or that's what the person who called it in said."

Leon flicked on the emergency lights, their red and blue glow made seemingly insignificant by the morning sun. The wail of the sirens was swallowed up by distance as Leon sped away, leaving the suburbs once again to their morning tranquility.


	2. Chapter 2: Sometimes They Come Back

Leon found he was not the only one who had plans to see the first murder victim in fifty years

Leon found he was not the only one who had plans to see the first murder victim in fifty years. When he arrived on the scene, he was forced to park in the middle of the street, so numerous were the cars lining the sides of the road. Jumping out, Leon was greeted by the sight of thirty or so people crowding around one of his other deputies, Mike Martin. Mike wasn't hard to spot. At 6'4 and 280 pounds of solid muscle, it would be easy to mistake Mike for a small bear on hind legs. The neatly trimmed black beard didn't leave too much to the imagination. Mike looked hard pressed. Even from the distance, Leon could tell exactly what he was saying.

"You can't go in. You'll contaminate the scene. I don't care if you knew the victim; this is a sheriff's office matter now." Mike was one of those "by the book" cops. If it wasn't done according to regulation and rule, it was wrong. Despite that, Leon both liked and trusted the man, and often gave him the position of "unofficial second in command".

Leon pushed through the crowd of people. As he made his way, a silence fell in his wake; a silence like that of a graveyard. Whispers started up; Leon caught snatches of "That's him, the ex-agent," and "He's crazy, that's why they sent him here." He ignored the hushed conversation, and spoke to his deputy.

"Mike, what's going on?"

"Not really sure, sir. Some lady called in that somebody was lying dead in their back yard, missing most of their neck. Dispatch sent me out to take a look; said the caller was hysterical. Wouldn't give her name or address."

"Trace it?"

Mike gave him a blank look.

"Right, right… That's the problem with small town police operations; we never have the tech to meet all our demands…" said Leon. "How are things looking?"

"One corpse, sir. Whoever phoned it in wasn't kidding about that. They also managed to phone half the town. These people have been here for ten minutes, clamouring for a look at the body; a look at the scene; a look at the house, even. This is the problem with small towns, I swear I …"

Leon whistled and jerked his head towards the crowd of people, still whispering and furtively pointing.

"Oh. Right. I called EMS; they just left with the body. The only thing I had time to do was take some pictures of the scene, and confirm whether or not she was dead. Place was a mess. I'm not sure if you knew her or not sir, but the victim was Crazy Christie."

"The animal lady?"

"Yes sir."

Leon knew her. Rather, he knew of her. Christie was famous around town for collecting strays and keeping them in her backyard. The twenty something blonde's eccentric behaviour was almost legendary. At one point, the neighbours had called Leon and asked him to have her pets removed to a veterinary office. Of course, there was nothing Leon could do until the animals became a nuisance.

"Let's go take a look."

Mike and Leon left the spectators clamouring in the drive and opened the gate to the backyard. A peculiar site met their eyes. Leon wondered how one woman had the time and resources to feed so many animals. Cage upon cage containing dogs, cats, and even a few possums were placed around the back of the spacious backyard. A single doghouse with a door fashioned from iron mesh and railing sat in the corner nearest the back door. Not a single animal made a sound. All of them watched Leon with a feral glint in their eyes. A chill ran down his back. Something about the animals unnerved him. It was almost as if the animals were saying things in voices only they could understand.

_We know what happened here. We know, but we won't ever tell. Because if we did, you'd have to believe us. Believe that all the fears and anxiety from your darkest nightmares are coming back to gnaw at your soul, the way a dog gnaws on a bone. And these fears… they're hungry. Ravenous, even._

The scene was made much stranger by the blood. A dark imprint on the ground marked the spot where Crazy Christie had breathed her last. Her body had lain long enough to leave an impression in the finely cut grass, better than any chalk outline. Dark reddish stains surrounded it, seeping into the depression caused by dead weight.

"Bad way to go," remarked Leon, " Seems like she crawled here from…"

His eyes followed a trail of the browning liquid to the structure in the corner.

"The dog house?"

Motioning for Mike to follow him, Leon approached the simple structure. As he neared the dog house, every animal in the backyard erupted into terrified noise. Dogs whimpered and barked frantically, cats hissed and mewed in terror, and the possums emitted high pitched shrieks. The sudden burst of noise froze the sheriff and his deputy in their tracks. Both of their hands dropped to the grips of their pistols. Then, as suddenly as it had begun, it stopped. Animals that had been clawing at their cages, clawing to get out and run away, to hide… were silent. It was as if nothing had ever happened. An eerie silence settled over the backyard. In the distance, a crow cawed lazily in the air.

"What the hell was that?" said Mike, the normally unshakeable deputy looking undoubtedly rattled.

"Who knows?" replied Leon, "I've never seen anything like that before."

As he reached out a hand to remove the latch and open the dog house door, a growl and an explosion of activity from inside caused him to jump back a full body length.

Thrashing its way out of the dim interior, a dog leapt face first against the iron mesh. Patches of hair had fallen out, leaving skin the color of an angry red exposed. Blood matted the canine muzzle, flecking into the air as the maddened animal snapped and fought to get out of its prison. Mike cried out and stepped back, planting a boot straight into the rust coloured pool of blood behind him, and falling flat on his back in the mess. Leon stood, frozen in horror, as the realization of what he was seeing dawned on him. The dog's frenzied efforts began paying off, as the mesh bellied outward and began to tear in places. The animal's own blood began mixing with that of its dead master's, though it seemed not to feel any pain.

"Mike." Leon's voice was calm, almost devoid of emotion, though his insides were a roiling mass of fear and confusion.

"Go get the shotgun out of your car."

Mike hadn't moved. Leon turned; slapped him once across the face nearly hard enough to send him sprawling.

"Now."

Mike nodded, and turned, walking slowly towards the gate, like a man in a dream, the dead woman's blood sticking to his clothing like thick syrup.

"RUN, DAMN IT!" Leon's harsh call set him off as though the hounds of hell themselves were at his heels. And when Mike thought about it, they probably were.

Leon stood, facing the disintegrating door and wondering why the past always had to come crashing down with such startling suddenness. Worse than the truth of his government indenture was his past with biological weapons and their effects on people he cared about. Too often he had woken up in a cold sweat, fading memories of nightmares turning to relief.

A particularly loud impact with the grating brought Leon back into the present, sweat coating his palms and body, stomach a pit of cold acid, and eyes glancing frantically about. Unknowingly, he had drawn his USP, and had it trained on the dog. He didn't want to risk firing and making more holes in the grate though, not without being sure the dog would die. Mike returned, stumbling in his haste.

Leon holstered his sidearm and held out his hand. Mike gave him the weapon, a Remington 870 MCS. Leon racked the pump, ejecting a shell through the port on the side of the weapon, and ensuring it was loaded.

"God help us all," he whispered, as he brought the sights to bear on the animal he knew was undead.

The people in front of Crazy Christie's house were still quite unsure as of just what to believe about their small town Sheriff. Many of them decided that they had urgent business to attend to when the four shotgun blasts rang out in quick succession from behind the house. The street cleared in what would surely have been record time, if such a record had existed. When Leon and Mike returned to the front of the property, they were surprised to see that only one person had remained to ask questions. Their surprise turned to disgust when the woman turned around and revealed herself to be none other than Madison Scherer, toting her designer bag and a tape recorder, which she promptly thrust into Leon's face.

"Sheriff Kennedy. Care to comment on what just happened? Why the gunshots? Anything to state for the record yet?" Leon was about to tell where to stick her damn tape recorder when Mike spoke up from beside him.

"Miss Scherer, it's too early to make any statements. We had to take care of a rabid animal. That's all. A woman just died, please, have some respect and wait until we inform the next of kin."

"I see." Madison smiled thinly. "Any idea where the body is going?"

Mike rolled his eyes.

"Ma'am, I'm afraid I can't tell you that. If you'd like to inquire about the status of the body, you'll have to go through the fam-"

The rest of Mike's sentence was interrupted as Leon roughly grabbed a hold of his deputy.

"Mike. Where the fuck is that body going?"

Something in Leon's eyes held every facet of Mike's attention.

"Body's going to General Hospital up in Umber. About an hour's drive. Why?"

Leon wasted no time. He sprinted to Mike's cruiser, threw the shotgun in the passenger seat, and jumped behind the wheel.

"Get in!" he called to Mike.

Realizing that something terribly important was about to happen, Mike jumped in the passenger seat.

"Go home ma'am," said Leon, in a dangerously quiet, calm, emotionless voice. If you know what's good for you, go home, lock every last one of your doors and windows, and stay out of sight."

Madison had time to do nothing more than utter a few stilted syllables before Leon threw the car in gear and left a black residue along with the stench of burnt rubber in his wake.

"Sir, what the fuck is going on?" asked Mike, "There was definitely something wrong with that dog other than rabies. Don't feed me any bullshit, sir, I have a wife and child in this town. If something's going on, I need to know about it." As he spoke, Mike replenished the shotgun's magazine tube from a box of spare shells in the glove compartment.

Leon was silent for a moment, as the car ate up the miles between Mount Forest and Umber.

"Mike, this isn't something I talk about very often. It's not something I talk about with just anybody either. I'll tell you once, and that's it. Don't ask me again. This isn't something you can go to a party to and tell your friends, 'Hey, see that guy? Go ask him about _this…_' Do you get me?"

"I get you sir. Please, tell me what's going on."

"Do you remember the incident in Raccoon City? Well…"

Over the next thirty minutes, Leon told Mike everything about his involvement in the incident at Raccoon City, leaving nothing out.. When he was done, Mike sat in silence for a moment.  
"These… zombies. They're a result of some freak virus?"

"Right. The virus was originally intended as a bio weapon, but the pharmaceutical lab developing it lost control of it and an outbreak started in Raccoon City."

"I see. And these zombies… they can only be killed by shots to the head?"

"Not entirely true. If you pump enough rounds into them they'll go down from sheer trauma to vital systems. However, the best option is to rupture the brain or sever the spinal cord."

Mike nodded. "Okay. I'm not entirely sure I believe you yet, but I don't entirely disbelieve you either. That dog was…"

"If we're lucky, you won't have to believe me. We'll go to the hospital, put the body under quarantine, and nothing will happen. If we're lucky."

As they moved closer and closer to the city of Umber, neither of them noticed the red Ferrari on their tail, a slim figure wearing sunglasses and a mysterious smile behind the wheel.


	3. Chapter 3: Old Friends

**A/N: Hey, if anybody's still out there, I'd like to apologize for the long wait on this one. I realize I said I'd have the next one out in a few days, and I didn't. This was due to completely unforeseeable circumstances. Namely, my birthday and a subsequent week of partying/paintball. Call me an idiot, sure. I tried with this one, really, I did. Not sure how it came out. And if anyone's coming back after reading the other two chaps, then take notice.**

**I changed Leo's name to Mike.**

**Why? Because Leo and Leon was a horrible decision.**

* * *

Leon sat with his deputy in the parking lot of Umber's General Hospital. The ambulance stood a few feet away, lights flashing; sirens silent. Sweat beaded Leon's brow. They had been sitting in the lot for a full two minutes, and every minute was one Leon could ill afford to waste. Even worse, Leon saw no activity in the open doors of the ER reception.

"Let's not waste any more time," said Leon, opening the glove box and taking two pairs of ear plugs. "Every second counts." He opened the door, and leapt out.

Mike followed suit, his pockets stuffed with spare shells. Leon moved around the car and looked in the ambulance's driver side window; saw nobody. He flicked his head to the back of the emergency response vehicle, and the pair moved to the rear doors. Mike took a few steps back, then nodded to Leon, who was standing ready to the side; his hand on the latch. With a quick flick of his hand, he loosed one of the doors and flung it wide, as Mike stepped forward and observed the interior of the vehicle, shotgun muzzle leading the way.

"Empty," Mike announced.

Leon nodded to his deputy. Mike popped the trunk on his car, and Leon removed a bag before closing it. Both broke for the open door to ER reception.

Reception was as silent as the parking lot. The stillness was akin to that of a shocked spouse finding out they were a new widow. Umber was a small town, but it held the only real hospital for miles around. It was almost a given that there would be a few people waiting to be treated, or a nurse or two standing in reception. The fact that there was nobody in sight behind the desk or in the lobby gave Leon a very bad feeling.

The Mount Forest Sheriff led the cautious advance through the large double doors, sweeping the room with the barrel of his pistol, on the lookout for any movement. Finding none, he announced the room clear and began searching for some sign of the staff with his deputy.

The phone on the stark white desk lay off the hook. No dial tone sounded after Leon hit the disconnect a few times, then he realized he had yet to select a line. Finding the appropriate button, he was rewarded with the dull hum of a phone line. Punching in 911, he waited expectantly. Leon found only confusion and disappointment when a recording told him that his call could not be connected at this time, and would he please try again at a later time?

"This doesn't make any sense," said Leon, holstering his sidearm. "The phone lines are up, but calls won't go through. Not even to emergency response." His uneasiness grew till it was an almost palpable creature, perched on his shoulders gnawing at his brain.

Mike spoke over his shoulder as he was covering the halls and elevators leading out of reception. "Sir, we're here to find a body. We'd better get moving, if this virus is what you say it is."

"Right, Mike. Find a map, we need to hit the morgue."

Mike strode over to a wall and tapped a glass case bolted to the wall. "Way ahead of you, sir." The map was encased in a few flat planes of glass and screwed into the wall. After a few moments of examination, Mike spoke again. "Doesn't seem like there's a morgue on the ground floor. My guess is underground, sir."

Leon agreed. He'd been involved in public service too long to think that a building planner would ever leave something as potentially disheartening as a morgue on a first floor. Leon pointed to one of the sets of sliding doors and wall mounted panels that marked an elevator. "Let's do it."

The elevators were modern affairs, of course. The General Hospital was only a few years old, and as such, had a bank of lettered and numbered lights above the door indicating which floor the elevator was currently on. Leon hit the button, and watched for the light. After five seconds, he saw nothing, and hit the call button again. This time, the light at "B2" flashed on, followed by the light at "B1" six seconds later.

"This is taking an awfully long time," remarked Mike.

"Must be full of equipment or something. We're lucky the cables haven't snapped and it still works. We'll have to clear it out when it gets up here; I don't feel like dying because of an overloaded elevator."

Mike smirked, his self assurance a boon to Leon's increasing doubts about the safety of the hospital staff and its patients. A strange banging sound issued from somewhere, and both men turned as if shocked by a cattle prod. Their probing eyes sought the source and found nothing, yet the banging sound increased, growing in volume. It took Leon a moment to realize where the sound was coming from.

"Get away from the elevator!" Leon screamed to his deputy, and not a moment too soon. As the light over the door hit "G" and a small chime played, the doors opened, and spilled out a flurry of stumbling, moaning hospital patients and staff. Leon dumbly noted that the first one out had a beaten its fists and forearms to broken lumps of useless flesh and shattered bone against the interior elevator doors. _Guess that solves the mystery of the things that go bump in the night_, thought Leon, almost hysterically.

Then the time for thought was gone, and there was only time for action and movement, or death. Leon's USP was in his hands before he even thought of drawing it; the safety flicked off in the same breath. His first shot went wide, missing the first zombie's head entirely and flying into another's jaw, the round impacting teeth and bone, leaving the once blonde woman with what looked like an extreme case of lockjaw.

Time seemed to slow. The moaning and gurgling of the mangled office workers faded into something akin to background noise. He was able to hear every one of his own breaths, and each seemed as loud as gale force wind. Leon acutely felt every beat of his heart in his chest, and noticed in a detached manner that his heart rate did not seem elevated. Leon raised his weapon by a hairsbreadth, and acquired a target, the three-dot sights spelling out death for the luckless undead in front of him. He squeezed the trigger almost unknowingly, and the shot seemed almost a surprise, though he had known it would come. A shape not unlike that of a rose seemed to blossom in the dead man's face, and his head snapped back ever so slightly, as his eyes closed again, this time for the last.

Then everything fell back into place, and Leon realized he was screaming, not out of fear, or frustration, but because this was what he was trained for; what he lived for; what he had hoped would never be released again. He pulled the trigger on his USP twelve more times, scoring more shots that did not drop his targets than he had hoped. When the slide locked back, and the weapon was empty, Leon realized that there were too many too close for him to reload before one of them killed him, and his hand went for the knife he had on his belt, the knife that he had carried through the mission in Spain, the knife that had saved his life more times than he cared to count. And he knew that he would die here anyway, die and rise again as the living dead.

The welcome roar of the shotgun was deafening if not for the earplugs in the enclosed hallway, and Leon realized that Mike was screaming too, screaming in much the same way Leon was, but not because his blood was running high and he felt adrenaline clogging his veins. Mike screamed because monsters from the minds of movie directors and book writers were spilling out of an elevator towards him, intent on eating his still living body and making him one of them, and becoming one of these mindless horrors plunged Mike into a spiral of madness that only slaughter would cure.

Grateful for a two second respite, Leon hit the magazine release on the grip with his middle finger, and fished a new magazine from the pouch containing two spares on his side. Twelve fresh rounds slid into the weapon, one moving into the chamber as Leon flicked the slide release down with a thumb. The slide slid forward, locking on the chamber and priming the weapon to fire. Mike had fired six shells, and showed no sign of slowing down his rapid pump-and-shoot actions. Only two zombies were left, climbing clumsily over the pile of their dead comrades. Mike spent his last two shells into the chest of the one nearest him, while Leon took one careful shot into the last's skull.

After so much noise, the silence itself seemed almost deafening. Both men stood rigid, weapons pointed at the elevator entrance portal, half expecting to see another legion of undead pour forth.

"Mike." Leon's voice seemed strange even to him, as if it were someone else speaking. "Load that weapon."

Mike started as if in a trance, then fell against the wall, shivering. He reloaded the shotgun, dropping more than one shell as his hands twitched. Leon understood what he was going through. Until today, Mike had lived in a world that was clear cut, a world that was easily understood. He had lived his life by a series of rules, one of which was that once one dies, they are dead, and that's that. His life had just taken a sharp turn down the path of inexplicable, and would stay that way until someone exposed the science behind the virus in terms he could grip.

Leon picked up the shells that were rolling about on the ground, and then pulled his deputy to his feet. "Help me find a couple of mops." At another time, Mike probably would have given him a quizzical look and an inquiring "Sir?" Now, Mike simply nodded and stalked off down one of the hallways, his gait reminiscent of a drunk. Leon looked at the puddle of spreading ichor, memories of a city in flames and screams in the distance flooding his senses. He turned and vomited into a waste bin.

Mike returned not two minutes later, looking like some kind of idiot custodian with a shotgun cradled in one arm and two long handled mops in the other. Leon thought he looked a lot calmer than he had a few minutes ago, and silently thanked whatever deity was above them for giving him such a stolid deputy.

"Mops." Mike uttered the single word like a death knell. Leon thanked him, and directed him to one side of the pile of corpses, some of which were still twitching.

"We're not going to clean this blood, are we sir?" asked Mike, incredulity in his eyes.

"Well, I wouldn't want to leave a mess like this for the janitor…" Leon trailed off at the expression on his deputy's face, a grim smile appearing on his own. "Push the bodies into the elevator. There's something we need to do."

Mike nodded and turned his face to the grisly work, not wanting to meet his superior's eyes, for fear of him seeing what he felt as acutely as a bullet wound. The smile on Leon's face had scared him.

Pushing a body with a mop is hard work. Leon and Mike spent several gruelling minutes manoeuvring corpses into the tightly packed elevator, swearing as particularly resistant limbs caught on the sliding doors. When they were done, the pair of them walked back out of the double doors. Using some surgical tubing and an old bucket from the cart that had supplied the mops, Leon siphoned gas from the tank of the ambulance and brought it back into the hospital. He splashed it liberally into the interior of the elevator, then leaned inside and hit the "B2" button. Behind him, Mike produced a flare from the bag they had taken from the car, and struck it. Before the doors could finish closing, Leon tossed in the flare and watched as the flames licked eagerly at the gasoline soaked bodies. Crossing to the other side of the hall, he waited until the light above the elevator was somewhere between "B1" and "B2" before smashing the fire alarm. With a grinding of gears audible even over the wail of the alarm, the elevator stopped somewhere between the first and second basement, its valuable cargo able to burn in peace.

"Sir, how are we supposed to get downstairs now?"

"Stairs are faster than the elevator, Mike. Besides, there's a reason for the fire alarm. Fire alarms kill off elevators. Nothing else can come up from the other ones now. Anyway, can you imagine being stuck in a tight space like an elevator with one of those crowds pressing in after the doors open downstairs?"

Mike nodded, thoughtfully. He hadn't thought of that.

"And Mike. You can stop with the 'sir' stuff. The only rank we have right now is 'human' and 'otherwise'."

"Copy that, sir. I mean, Leon." Mike's mouth twisted awkwardly, as if referring to his superior by his first name hurt him. "Leon, there's something I've been meaning to ask you. Why are we still here? After that little incident we can say there's an outbreak here for sure. You said the President ordered Raccoon City obliterated. Shouldn't we be calling somebody right about – oh I don't know, ten minutes ago?"

"I'm hoping that the fire alarm will get the local fire department rolling. Normally, they'll bring police support to help with an evacuation. I'm hoping that between the two different groups they'll be able to at least lock this place down long enough for us to clear the morgue, and then we can sweep for survivors. I don't want _any_ innocent people left in this building. After that, we'll demo the hell out of this place and everything in it."

"Demo a hospital? Are you insane? The locals will never go for that!"

Leon shook his head. "It won't be in the locals' hands. The President is going to order it."

Mike gave him a look that was something between incredulity and disbelief. "How is the President going to okay that? He'd never do it; he'd lose face and let's be honest, you don't have that kind of pull."

Leon was silent a moment. "Read the papers when we get back. I have that kind of pull."

"What? I – Leon!" Mike found he was speaking to empty air. Leon was already back at reception checking the map for the nearest stairwell. Overhead, the fire alarm stopped ringing.

"There are too many turns to take. We'll have to write this down." Mike moved to the desk and found paper and pencil. The sound of glass smashing brought him whirling around, paper and pencil forgotten, shotgun sights seeking a target. Leon brushed shattered glass from his boot, and pulled the map free of the few remaining shards as Mike walked over and whistled.

"Hel-lo." Mike picked up a piece of the glass. "This stuff's a half inch thick, and it's mounted pretty much on the wall. That's some kick you've got there, Leon."

Leon allowed himself a smile. "So I'm told."

With the map in hand, the pair made their way through the first floor of the hospital on guard for surprises lurking around corners. Strangely enough, the entire first floor seemed deserted. A few times the public announcement squawked out static, and once Leon thought he heard music, but when he stopped to listen it seemed as if it was never there.

They reached the stairwell without further incident. Leon again opened the door and let his shotgun toting deputy take point. Mike pronounced the immediate area clear, and Leon moved in to find his deputy scratching his head in puzzlement.

The stairs to the upper levels were blocked off by a sturdy looking door made of iron bars much like that in a prison, complete with padlock. "Leon, this doesn't make any sense. No hospital would be built like this – stairwells locked? What if there was a real fire?"

"That isn't all," Leon said. "Look at the stairs. That is a _lot_ of dust. Nobody's been up this stairwell, much less seen it, in probably a few months. That's my guess."

"What's going on, Leon?"

Several things occurred to him, none of which were comforting. "I don't know. Let's check the basements, I want to get to the bottom of this."

Mike refrained from making a comment about the horrible pun, and followed his superior's lead down the stairs – and straight into his back. Leon was silently observing another iron grate, this one the mirror image of the one upstairs, were it not for the door missing.

"Look," Leon said, pointing at the floor. "Thermate paste residue." The hinges on the door had been burned off, if the yellow stains on the ground had anything to say about it. "And look here," Leon indicated a section of the wall with inch deep three foot long gouges in it. "Blades? Also, there are spent casings all over the place." He indicated the last by picking up a piece of the rounded brass.

Further conversation was curbed as both men heard the echoing sound of feet rapidly ascending the stairs. Leon exchanged looks with his deputy and moved up a few steps to allow Mike a better view of the stairwell – he had the shotgun, after all.

"This is Mount Forest Sheriff Leon Kennedy – I suggest you both slow and identify yourself." Leon's announcement was met with eerie silence. Even the echoing footfalls stopped. Hardly daring to breathe, Leon almost fell down the stairs when the lights went out. Hurriedly, he clawed at the utility light on his belt, and had just managed to turn it on when a high pitched shriek that froze his blood in his veins sounded from the stairwell beneath them.

"Mike, how many shells you have left?"

Mike was fumbling with the TAC-Light mounted in the shotgun's pump, and succeeded in turning it on. "Including the ones in the weapon, I've got ten – two to spare right now."

"Keep 'em handy. Get back upstairs."

Mike needed no second bidding. No sooner had he moved than the echoing footfalls sounded again, only this time, there seemed to be a half dozen runners. Leon produced a flare from the pouch, and struck it, giving the stairwell a much brighter green glow than his light provided. Dropping it over the railing, he stuck his head over and watched its descent. Running figures, illuminated a light green by the flare, seemed to bound and leap up the stairs. Leon caught a flash of something bright shining in one's hands and realized that he was seeing claws.

_Wasn't blades that made those marks,_ he thought, _Claws._ Leon watched the flare for another second before turning and fleeing out the door that he had come in.

Deep red emergency lights lit the hospital hallways. The power had gone out, and the building's backup lights gave only the barest hints of what might lay down a hallway. Leon was glad to see that Mike was already covering the door when he came out of it.

"They're coming. I don't know what they are. Shoot first, fuck asking questions."

Mike nodded, and set his sights directly on the door, grim concentration making his face a mask of cold iron. The sound of running steps grew closer… and stopped. Leon drew his sidearm, ready to give a few rounds of .45ACP to anything that came through the door. Both men stood, seemingly frozen in place, messengers of death ready to claim the first thing through the door.

A flurry of activity marked the start of another round of explosive music and brass applause, as a humanoid figure burst through the stairwell door into the hallway. Cloaked in red light, Leon only had time to note that it actually was green – it hadn't been the flare – and was covered in scales, before the first shotgun shell hammered into its chest, opening up a hole the size of two fists and flinging the creature back into the door, closing it on those behind. Leon noted with amazement that the creature was still alive and trying to get back up, before Mike pumped another shell into it and madly replaced the shells in the shotgun in a flurry of hand gestures.

_Looks almost like a frog,_ thought Leon, _But I'll be damned if I've ever seen a frog this big._

"Last shells, Leon," said Mike, worry written across his face. "I've still got my sidearm."

"Two magazines. I pray it'll be enough," replied Leon. "Here we go!" The first clawed hand smashed into the door, carving a swath of squealing metal through the door. Both men knew their weapons didn't have the punch needed to reach through the metal door; shot would ricochet and likely injure them, and Leon's .45's were hollow point. All they could do was wait until a big enough hole opened and the dark shapes poured through. They weren't kept in suspense long. Two more swipes and a sizeable section of the door was latticed, almost like a fence. The door ceased to be an obstacle as one of the creatures leapt through the weakened section of the door, smashing through the weakened steel and leaving open the way for those behind it.

Mike's first shot took the creature in center mass, just a little high, and it dropped where it stood. The gurgling sound emanating from its gaping maw was the final symptom of the shotgun surgery. Mike racked the pump. Leon took the next shots as another came leaping out of the shattered door, putting six rounds into its chest and allowing the .45's to do their work. The next two minutes became a blur in Leon's mind. He vaguely noticed Mike screaming that he was out of shells, then drawing his side arm – a Colt Python in .45 – and letting loose with the rounds as fast as the recoil allowed. Leon was on his last magazine; he had maybe four rounds left. Mike broke the cylinder in his revolver and shook out the spent cartridges. He pulled a full moon clip from his belt and fitted the rounds into their holes before closing the cylinder with a flick of the wrist.

The last of Leon's bullets went into another of the frog-creatures, it's dying croaks spreading around the hall like the pools of its blood. In a rage, he threw his empty sidearm through the hole, where it clattered harmlessly to the ground. Leon knew then that there was only one thing left to do. He drew his knife, and turned to his deputy, uttering a single word. "Run!"

Mike complied with alacrity. Leon led the way back, disregarding the map in his pocket, turning wherever he felt, and hoping they were going to make the exit. The sound of feet flapping on the tile followed them, and Leon knew they wouldn't be able to outrun their pursuers. He prayed for a miracle, and got it. The shattered glass of the map case beckoned, and he put on an extra sprint toward the doors, turning his head to beckon his deputy forward. Just in time.

"Down!" he screamed, as one of the frog-creatures took a flying leap towards his deputy. Leon was never gladder that Mike could follow orders without thinking. The deputy hit the ground stomach first, sliding to a slow stop in front of the elevators, as the clawed hand passed above his head and cut air rather than flesh. Leon had no ammunition; he did the only thing he could think of. The blade buried itself in the creatures chest, calling forth a sticky green slop of blood that slowly leaked out around the deep wound. Leon assumed a fighting stance, knowing it was useless. His knife wouldn't stop something like that, it was probably just pissed off. He was ready to die, waiting for it, but he wanted at least one good shot at the thing before it tore his head off, one kick or punch to give it something to remember him by.

The back of its head exploded, in a shower of pulpy brain and shards of stained bone. Mike stood against the wall by the elevators, winded but breathing, and aiming the revolver in his hands. Leon leaned forward and extracted his knife from the creature's chest, wiping it on a nurse's cap. "Thanks."

Mike only nodded, and turned to cover the rear. Neither of them noticed the figure of a woman come into the building, shuffling quietly on unsure footsteps, as she closed the gap between herself and Leon. He didn't notice until it was too late. Sensing a presence behind him, he spun, and figured he was going to die _again,_ for the second or third time that day. His knife was in his hand, arcing towards the throat of the young woman behind him, her blonde hair pulled back and sunglasses covering her eyes. Her mouth was open, ready to bite and he nearly finished the stroke which would've killed her.

Madison Scherer, reporter for the Mount Forest Gazette stood with the tip of a knife almost inside of her throat, mouth open, first syllables of a coming question frozen on her lips, and a look of pure terror in her eyes. Disgusted, Leon removed the knife from her neck and deftly sheathed it.

"Why are you here!?" He shouted. "I thought I told you to go home!"

Madison sank down on one of the chairs in the waiting area, legs weak. "I want the story, you crazy bastard! You almost killed me you know!?"

"Pity for small miracles," snarled Leon.

"Pardon my French, but what the fuck is that?" said Madison, staring with rapt attention at the still-twitching corpse of the frog-creature.

"Who knows?" said Leon, "All I know is that it likes to try and kill people. Hey, put that away!"

The reporter had pulled a small tape recorded and a camera, and was taking photos of the corpse with an expert hand. "Why? I just want the story, and I'm gonna get a story!"

Leon snatched the camera from her hands and threw it at the wall. It exploded into a storm of grey plastic and film. He picked up the tape recorder and removed the tape, then crushed it under his heel. The recorder he left in a waste bin exuding the smell of vomit.

"Wha – You'll pay for those!" Madison raged at him as he calmly told her about the proper proceedings and how she would have to wait for photos and interviews.

"Pardon me, but can we please get the fuck out of here?" said Mike. "I think we're going to need some help." Mike's voice shut both of them up.

Leon agreed, and turned to Madison. "This is no time to be here, we've got a virus outbreak, what looks like biological weapons, and a lot of dead people. Give me your cell phone."

Madison handed him her phone, and began scribbling madly in a notebook, muttering about viruses and biological weapons. As Leon opened the phone and began dialling, he heard the musical sound of chimes. The elevator doors opened, and Mike had time for an almost apologetic shrug and a half smile at Leon before the reanimated bodies of several hospital workers rushed out and buried teeth in his body. Mike's cries of pain soon turned to a single choked gurgle, and then nothing.

Leon felt the scream building in his body, but was outmatched by the reporter, hers a shrill expression of terror, and his combining animal rage with a budding sadness. Automatic weapons fire erupted from behind him and Leon threw himself to the ground, covering the reporter with his body as hot casings rained on him while bullets tore into the pack of zombie flesh. The reporter's scream continued, a high pitched keening wail that grated on his ears. He wondered why she didn't run out of breath. The bursts stopped, and nothing moved in the hospital.

Rough hands seized him, and he felt himself pulled upright. Madison was subjected to the same treatment, still screaming as though she was trying to drown out an air raid siren. Leon found himself staring into the eyes of a gas mask. A man dressed all in black and geared up for what looked like a war was hauling him to his feet. The man spoke, and Leon found that it was not a man at all, but a woman.

"Shut that girl up!" A similarly dressed man behind her tried to calm Madison down with little effect. "Awe hell, move Parkins!" the woman snapped. She stepped up to Madison and gave her a right hook that landed neatly on her chin, dropping her like a ton of bricks. "That's better. You there, Sheriff Kennedy?"

Leon nodded. The woman spoke with a southern drawl, and carried herself with a practiced ease. She was holding a UMP submachine gun like she knew how to use it, and wore enough magazines to crush a child under their weight.

"Sorry we couldn't save your man. Didn't get here in time. Everything should be fine now." She indicated the group of men filing up behind her. "We're here on orders from the President."

* * *

**A/N: And that's chapter three. Review if you will, if you'd like to take the time to call me a lying ass hat for taking a week rather than a couple days.**

**Also, my other author's notes are gone. Through the magic of human stupidity I forgot to save them and repaste them into the chapters. Meh, no big loss.**


	4. Chapter 4: Home Sweet Home

**A/N: Well, I guess there's no real excuse for this. By "this", I mean not writing anything for about two weeks or something. Since there's no excuse, I'll just go with the truth. I forgot. I totally forgot about this story. I mean, hey, university started back up, I've been reading textbooks and not much else, and now the faculty is on strike. So I have plenty of time to start writing this again.**

**If anybody from before who favorited this story still errm... exists, thank ChioneTheMetroid for putting this in his/her story alert, which subsequently sent me an email/reminder about it.**

* * *

The man in black watched those around him with eyes narrowed in disbelief

The man in black's face never changed as he pored over the documents in front of him. His eyes were hidden by mirrored sunglasses that matched the rest of his outfit. He sat at a desk bare except for the sheaf of papers on top. The dark wood was a contrast to the rest of the room. Sterile white was spread liberally across the four walls, the roof, and even the floor. Fluorescents mounted in ceiling brackets gave the only illumination, and much of the only sound, as they gave off an electric hum.

The room would have been very plain if not for the four men it contained, and the desk. One sat at the desk. Two others flanked him, clad also in black suits but with white shirts and no sunglasses. They towered over both men, standing at least six and a half feet tall. Both had blue eyes like chipped ice, and had their hair cut short. The suits they wore were cut slightly wider than need be. This was to cover the angular outlines of the semi automatic pistols held in shoulder holsters under their jackets. Both men stared straight ahead, almost as if they saw nothing but the wall in front of them. Only a fool would have taken their cool indifference as anything other than alertness. Those eyes never seemed to move, but the last man in the room knew they caught everything.

Frank Deloitte was almost invisible in the room. His white coat and clothes nearly caused him to disappear into the background. If not for his black shoes, one might think they would have been speaking to a floating head. Frank's eyes were a shade of brown so light one might call them hazel. He kept his hair cut short, a memento of past days, and did not care that it was beginning to be shot through with grey. His angular face also sported glasses, though neither lens was mirrored, or even black.

At first glance, Frank could be taken as a hard man. He kept himself in decent enough shape, and the snug way his clothes fit was a testament to that. He carried himself in a way that suggested he knew how to handle himself, and didn't care whether or not people took notice of it. The reality was that Frank lifted weights three times a week. The reality was that he was a black belt in both karate and kickboxing. The reality was that none of it would help him now.

The man in black was just finishing a sentence as Frank ceased looking for escape routes. There were none; he knew that from previous trips to this room. Thinking hard, he had to fumble for a response before finding the correct one. "What? Er, yes, we are finding that the test subjects are increasingly hard to domesticate."

"I see." The man in black fell silent, leaning back in his chair and putting a thoughtful hand to his chin to stroke the beginnings of a beard. "You need to work faster. I've never missed a deadline before in my life. Now will not be the first time."

No threats had been spoken, but all the same, Frank felt the pressure to succeed as acutely as if the man had put a gun to his head. "Sir, we're going as fast as we can. The subjects take time to grow and condition, even to the point where we can contain them. If we were to have better test samples…"

The man in black started visibly. "Of course, why not?" He muttered to himself for a moment before picking one of the documents out of the spread before him. "You are to use test group '13A'. There had better be more favourable results with these more… intelligent subjects, yes? Or I may decide to use your families as –" He was cut off as Frank exploded into action, clearing the ten feet of space between himself and the desk in three leaping strides. The man in black very nearly went for the gun in one of the drawers of the desk before he remembered there was no need.

Almost without seeming to move, the two men flanking him were in front of him. Frank was on the ground before he could do more than reach for the man's throat, one man pinning him with a knee in his face, the other covering him with a handgun.

The man in black looked almost pleased. "I forgot, you don't take well to threats against your family. Most people here would sell me their youngest daughters with a smile on their face and a free gift of their wives if they thought it would release them from the facility."

Frank struggled futilely against the man on top of him. "If you so much as even touch them, I'll –" He gasped as the man pinning him gave his arm a tug that nearly pulled it from its socket.

"Beat him," said the man in black, with as much emotion in his voice as a block of steel. As one of his bodyguards began pistol whipping the scientist into unconsciousness, he wondered what possessed some of his other… employees… to care about their own lives so much as to give up that of their family's. He would do whatever it took to protect his own family. As the sound of polymer meeting flesh and the pained grunts behind faded into silence, a smile broke out on the man's face. Whatever it took.

Leon very nearly passed out in exhaustion on the way back to Mount Forest. Madison drove at a much more sedate pace than they had set to get to Umber. The danger was over, for now. Leon sighed and sank deeper into the seat of the red Ferrari, head leaning against the window. His eyes closed as his memory drifted back to minutes ago.

"We're here on orders from the President."

Leon nearly fell back down with relief. "Who are you guys?"

"We're with the United States Biological Hazard Disposal Operations. Orders came down from Eagle One himself."

"Do you guys know what you're dealing with in here?"

The woman gave him a blank stare he felt even through her mask. "'Course. Otherwise we wouldn't be here." Men in teams of five were filing into the hospital and disappearing down the hallways. Sporadic gunfire sometimes broke out, only to be silenced a few moments later. A burst of static came through on the woman's earpiece, loud enough for Leon to hear, but the rest was inaudible. After a second, she raised her hand to her throat and muttered something else Leon couldn't hear.

"What's going on?"

"Nothin' for to you to worry about. We have standin' orders to get you clear of the building before we secure it and make ready to demo up." The red glare of the emergency lights blinked, plunging the hospital into darkness for only a moment before the white fluorescents flashed back on. "Power's back. Good news."

Leon nodded. "I'll let you carry out your orders then." He reached down and gathered the unconscious form of the reporter to him. He almost hated to carry her out of there, but it had to be done. "And ma'am…" Leon hesitated a moment. "Make sure my deputy doesn't… come back. He was a good man, and he wouldn't want that. I know I don't."

The woman in black gave him a nod, and escorted him from the building.

What Leon saw in the parking lot surprised him. There were perhaps a dozen black vans parked in the lot, some with people in them. Most were empty. One or two were stuffed full of ammunition and assorted small arms. The woman in black led them to one containing what looked to be a miniature hospital. Smelling salts were produced, seemingly from nowhere, and Madison was brought around. As soon as she could open her eyes, she looked ready to scream again, but the raised fist of the woman in black quieted her.

"We're leaving," said Leon, dragging her to her car.

At some point, Madison had recovered well enough to begin nattering away at Leon, pestering him for control of her car. After a moment, Leon gave in, and they pulled over to switch places.

"I could ticket you for this," he said, as Madison pushed the speedometer past 120.

"Like I care," she replied with a devilish grin.

Leon realized he didn't care enough at the moment to do much of anything other than try not to fall asleep. Nothing short of witnessing a road side bombing or genocide was going to get him on his feet again.

The drive back to Mount Forest was uneventful. At some point, Leon lost the battle with exhaustion and fell into a deep sleep. He did not dream.

"Wake up. We're home."

Leon raised his head and peered out the window. The sun was low in the western sky. "What happened to the day?" He grumbled, rubbing at his eyes.

"I had some… errands to run," Madison replied. "You looked so peaceful sleeping that I just left you in the passenger seat and took care of business."

"What business was that?"

"Oh, you know. Reporter stuff." She smiled coyly at him.

"Next time, wake me up. Sleeping in a car is not the most comfortable experience I've ever had."

"I'd bet."

Muttering to himself about the problems with women, he opened the door and got out. The Mount Forest Sheriff's department was across the street. He stretched, and began walking towards the building, whistling softly to himself. Maybe it was because he was tired. Maybe it was because his brain didn't want to accept that anything else could go wrong on this day. Maybe it was because his mind kept replaying those last few seconds of Mike's life –

_Shrug, and a grin. Maybe he was finding some humour in the absurdity of all. Maybe he was laughing at the irony of surviving dozens of amphibious monsters to be killed by his own species. Maybe he was – _

It was probably due to a combination of all of those things together that he didn't notice right away. Halfway across the street, he saw the door to the building standing crazily open, swinging in the breeze, little bells that had been Chelsea's touch lying on the floor. Pretending that he had forgotten something, he spun around and walked casually back to Madison's car.

"Forget something?" she asked.

"Do you keep a gun in the car?"

She gave him a blank stare for a full three seconds.

"I thought not. Do you have any uhh… mace, or something?"

She reached over and pulled open the glove box, rummaged around then extracted a tube about as long as her hand was wide. She handed it to him without a word.

"You should probably get going now. Go home. Lock your thousand locks and hide. Don't talk to anybody. The best thing you can do is forget you ever saw this. And by the way…" she stopped giving him the nod that people reserve for those times when they want to seem like, 'I'm listening to _everything_ you're saying in a thoughtful manner.'

If you ever print _any_ of what you saw today, I'll probably be _ordered_ to leave you in a ditch somewhere." Without waiting to hear her spluttered replies about threats of violence and freedom of information, he turned back and crossed the street, canister of mace or pepper spray or whatever it was in his back pocket.

The front desk was deserted. Chelsea was nowhere in sight, and there was no sign of noise in the Trench. The lights were all on, and several computers were running. Leon stood at the door to the Trench, guessing how high the chance of being shot was if he bolted for the other side of the room – the armoury. He figured it was pretty high. Leon slunk low into the room, slapping at the light switch on the wall as he went, and wondering whether or not it was a blessing or a curse that all the shades were drawn.

He settled on a blessing.

With the shades drawn, it was dark enough for him to move without being seen,

unless somebody happened to have a pair of night vision goggles. He felt his way around the Trench, avoiding the cubicles lit by computer monitors, until he hit the door to his office. Very slowly, he eased it open and slithered inside.

His office looked no different from when he had left it. Standing, he felt around in the dark for the keys to the armoury before tripping over something soft on the ground. Part of him already knew what it was, but he activated his belt light and winced at the sight before him. Chelsea lay at his feet, barely recognizable. Blood matted her hair, and Leon didn't have to check for a pulse to know that she was dead.

He did anyway.

He knelt next to her, and gathered her in his arms, before placing a brotherly kiss on her bloody forehead. "I'm sorry." He sat that way for a long time, holding his dead receptionist in his arms. He sat, wondering how many people in his life were going to die because he couldn't protect them. He sat, and wondered.

Leon was drawn out of his reverie by noise from the Trench. There was noise out there, and that meant something was going to die a bloody death. He laid down Chelsea's body and clicked off his belt light. The room suddenly seemed alien in the darkness. His night vision was shot, and he crouched while he waited for it to come back.

Leon knew that it takes the average person about thirty minutes to fully adjust to darkness. He also knew he wasn't going to give whoever was out there even a tenth of that time to live. His hand went for the handle of his knife, and found reassurance in its weight. He waited for the door to his office to open.

Something that sounded remarkably like the bolt catch on one of the Sheriff's department AR-15's being released made Leon drop, and not a moment too son. The sharp explosions that Leon recognized as rifle fire came like precursors to a storm, as glass shattered and rained down around him while bullets perforated the wall.

"Here it comes, motherfucker!"

Leon recognized that voice. He waited for the automatic fire to stop. "Nolan! Cease fire! It's me, Leon!"

"Bullshit!" Came the reply.

Leon ducked his head again as the sound of an empty magazine hitting the floor faded away. As the automatic fire started again, he started laughing, short bursts of giggles that just wouldn't stop. The irony of it all was scathing in its clarity. He was sure that somewhere above him, whatever gods existed were getting a real kick out of trying to kill him with one of the people he wanted to protect.

He was still laughing when the world exploded.

* * *

**A/N: Haha, game over, bad end, rite? Wrong. I just wrote this chaper real quick as a kind of "get back into the mindset" type thing. No, the story is not over, and no, I'm not done. If anybody cares. I should _hopefully_ be adding another chapter or two to this soon. And I actually mean it this time.**


	5. Chapter 5: Trench Warfare

****

A/N: Okay guys, here it is. This one's a little short too, sorry.

Enjoy. Or don't.

**We'll see.**

* * *

A huge boom sounded in the Trench, and everything around him turned white. Nolan cried out as his vision was stolen and his hearing seemed to evaporate. The only sound he registered was the ringing in his ears. Blindly, he turned and squeezed the trigger of the AR 15, sending rounds in every direction. The only thing that told him the weapon was dry was the sudden disappearance of recoil and the lack of resistance in the trigger. Fumbling blindly with his eyes squeezed shut, he grappled with the vest he was wearing for a magazine, found one, and then dropped it as a series of bone jarring impacts hit him in the torso. Gasping for breath, he lost his footing as the pain set in, then dropped into a dark abyss as his head met the edge of a desk on his way down.

Leon heard the explosion as if it had gone off right next to him. Light streamed in through the holes in the wall, and under the crack in the door, causing him to shut his eyes to preserve night vision. Leon couldn't even hear himself scream and was vaguely aware of his hands clapping themselves to his ears. Moments passed. The ringing in his ears allowed no sound to carry from the other room. Cautiously, he inched open the door and stuck his head out.

Nolan was nowhere to be seen. Leon feared for his deputy, but was more concerned with the owner of the flashbang. There was nobody in sight. Some sixth sense warned Leon not to move. He obeyed, using only his eyes to survey the room. Dark shapes moved among the cubicles, carrying sub machine guns and wearing night vision goggles. They were converging on the opposite corner of the Trench.

"I guess I've found my deputy," he muttered to himself, then fell silent as one of them moved towards him. He moved to the side of the door, leaving it open a hair's breadth, eye glued to the crack. The man moved to the door of the office, stopped, and stared. Leon felt his breath catch. A quick burst through the thin wood, and he would die here; at this range there was no chance of a miss and no hope of lady luck smiling on him as she had done so many times today.

The man turned away from the office door, and moved to circumvent the corner of the cubicle nearest the blinds. Leon had the door open with knife in hand in a flash. His left hand came up from behind and covered the man's mouth and nose as his other hand – the hand with the knife – whipped up and over the man's right shoulder. All the day's stress gave Leon a maniacal strength, and the knife nearly kissed the man's spine as Leon cut his throat. The man's right hand came off the grip of his weapon, flying up to his neck in a reflexive motion. Leon stabbed him under the arm, angling the knife in and sliding it out in one smooth motion, praying it wouldn't catch on a rib. He reversed his grip on the knife and held it ice pick style, then stabbed the man again just above the collarbone, driving down and cutting side to side cruelly. The man convulsed, and his right arm dropped to his side, left hand coming up to try and tear away Leon's hand smothering him. Leon ripped the knife out of the man's body, reversed his grip again, then stabbed the man a final time in the kidney. The whole operation took less than four seconds.

The man would have been dead after the first stroke, but something in Leon was telling him to brutalize, and he was giving in after a long fight against it. The gurgling as the man's destroyed trachea sucked air and blood was far from silent, and the rest of the targets in the room were quickly becoming aware that something was wrong. Leon grabbed the submachine gun in the man's hands, letting his body fall and cutting the sling with his knife in one motion. The knife slipped out of his hand, slick with blood, but Leon had a firearm now, and didn't mind the loss. With his now empty right hand, he reached over to the wall, and squinted – then pulled the drawstring on the shades.

Light flooded the room. The targets – that was what they had become now, targets – cried out as they were flash blinded through their goggles. There four of them, Leon noted, and two of them were struggling with their goggles while the other two were bringing weapons to bear in his direction.

A burst of fire cut loose from two of them, staccato bursts, coming quick and at regular intervals. The pistol rounds met wood, splintering the door and wall of Leon's office further decorating it. Leon was already gone. The roll he had thrown himself into ended with him behind a cubicle six feet to his left. He took a split second to take a look at the submachine gun in his hands. A UMP. Made by Heckler & Koch. The variant he was holding fed from a straight magazine, meaning it fired either .40 S&W or .45 ACP, and carried thirty or twenty-five cartridges respectively. He didn't have time to eject the magazine and observe one to ascertain. The weapon was equipped with a holo-sight, red dot projected on clear glass giving him an easy sight picture. The weapon was set to automatic. Perfect for close combat.

Leon rose to his feet smoothly, legs bent and leaning slightly into the weapon. He was almost glad he could barely hear anything as it was. The holo-sight made aiming a simple exercise in superimposing the red dot on center mass, an exercise which Leon was all too familiar with. The first man he turned the weapon on was removing his night vision goggles, blinking in an effort to clear his vision. The red dot found a place on the man's head, and Leon pulled the trigger and held it for a tenth of a second. Two rounds entered his skull, one just below the nose and another high in the forehead. Red lumpy spray appeared on the wall behind him. One target had ceased to exist.

Three left. Leon turned the weapon on the target closest to the windows, which was also removing its goggles. A burst from the weapon took him in the chest and he stumbled back against the glass, winded. Leon frowned. Body armour. A second burst and the man dropped to the ground, gasping and clutching at his chest. Another target neutralized.

Leon had no more time to shoot, and found himself sprinting along the line of cubicles in a crouch, as the other two targets opened fire on him, goggles raised above their eyes. The fire stopped momentarily. Both targets hit the magazine release on their weapons, empty magazines dropping to the floor in unison as they sought fresh ones from their vests.

Leon popped up, and the targets moved apart, one rolling and the other diving. He squeezed off a burst at the one diving, not knowing if he had scored a hit, then turned his attention on the other. Not knowing where to shoot, he emptied the weapon into the cubicles in a short line of holes, stitched irregularly along their walls. A body fell into view, blood leaking from the back of the neck and multiple wounds across his lower body. Three down, one to go.

Leon held the now useless weapon in his hands, hoping for some indication of where the other target had gone, eyes wide and searching. That question was answered when the target appeared at Leon's left, weapon levelled directly at him. The man's balaclava obscured everything but his eyes, but even then, Leon could still see him smile as his finger moved back towards the trigger.

Leon also saw the surprise in the man's eyes as the trigger broke, and nothing happened. It was then that Leon noticed the holes along the weapon's side. The burst he had fired before had struck the target's weapon, utterly destroying the upper receiver and rendering the weapon useless. The target muttered something Leon was sure was a curse, and let the submachine gun fall to his side as he moved to release the strap on his pistol holster.

Leon realized he was unarmed and at the mercy of a man who definitely had plans to kill him. Unthinkingly, he raised the UMP in his hands… and threw it as hard as he could at the target in front of him. The weapon wasn't very heavy, but it hit with enough force to make the target stumble, and delayed the drawing of his pistol long enough for Leon to close the distance between them.

A roar that was soundless in Leon's deafened ears erupted from him as his left hand shot out, and snatched the slide of the pistol as the man tugged it free of the holster. The boxy frame marked it as a Glock, and Leon was willing to bet that it had a compensator cut into the front of the slide. Meaning, if the man happened to fire a shot, Leon's hand was going to be very badly burned by discharge gases.

Quickly, he struck the man with his free hand twice in the face, hard to enough to crush soft cartilage in the nose and split his upper lip. He brought his right hand down to the rear of the Glock's grip, and twisted it viciously. The man's finger broke as the trigger guard came down on his knuckle, and his hand relaxed enough for Leon to wrench the pistol away from him as he screamed.

A broken finger was not enough to neutralize this target, however. The man's free hand came around in a sweeping motion, and hit Leon's hands hard enough to numb them for a moment. The Glock flew away from him, spinning crazily in the air before landing among the wreckage of the Trench.

Leon grabbed for his knife, and was rewarded with empty air. The blade caught the sunlight from where it lay, by the door to his office. The target's hands closed around Leon's throat, broken finger and all. He raised his hands and tried to pry the man's hands from his neck, and found that the man's forearms of steel resisted his attempts. Losing air and consciousness as blood flow to his brain slowly cut off, he delivered two sharp, short knees to the man's solar plexus, and was rewarded as the man's breath whooshed from his body. Gasping, the man drove forward with his legs and fell on top of Leon, pinning his lower body with his weight.

Leon pushed futilely against the oppressing weight. Blood rose up in his eyes as the pressure built up in his head and stars danced in front of him. The target's eyes bored into his, no trace of emotion in them. Scenes from the past day started to flash before him.

_He awoke from the dream, paralyzed with fear…_

"_God help us all," he whispered, as he brought the sights to bear on the animal he knew was undead..._

_The elevator doors opened, and Mike had time for an almost apologetic shrug and a half smile at Leon before…_

"_Forget something?" she asked._

"_Do you keep a gun in the car?" _

With a strangled grunt and a twist of his hips, he managed to throw his assailant slightly to the side. Leon's hand scrabbled along the floor towards his pocket, searching for what he needed, and finding it. Bringing the object up to head level, he let loose with a long, hissing spray from the can of mace. The man screamed as his eyes were saturated with the irritant and his hands leapt from Leon's throat to his face, rubbing furiously at his disabled eyes. Some of the liquid had rebounded off the man's face, and Leon's own eyes water furiously as he wriggled out from under the screaming man.

He crawled quickly to the third target, and fought to get the submachine gun away from the corpse before realizing it was connected to a sling and would not be taken short of cutting the cord. Opting for speed rather than lethality, he snatched the man's pistol from its holster and turned back to where the fourth man was writhing on the floor. He stalked back and stood over the target. Two shots rang out, and it was still.

Ears set ringing anew, Leon strode back to his office and picked up his knife, wiping it on the first dead man before returning it to its sheath. The man had bled out long ago. Leon looked at the pool of blood around him and shook his head, as if only now seeing what he had done. His hearing was starting to come back, although everything sounded as if he had cotton in his ears.

He crossed the room, and approached the second man he had shot. He was still breathing albeit irregularly.

_One of those rounds must have punched through that vest,_ he thought to himself. The man looked up at Leon with a burning anger in his eyes, then raised his own pistol in an unsteady hand. Leon fired twice more into the man's chest. The man coughed and dropped the pistol. Blood flecked his lips. Leon crouched next to him.

"Who sent you?" The words sounded muffled, like they were coming from someone in another room. "Why are you trying to kill me?"

The man looked at Leon for a moment. A blur of motion and there was a knife in his hand, streaking towards Leon's face. Leon fell back, a cut arcing along his cheek just below his eye, and sighed. Here was a man who wouldn't give up.

The man snarled and reached for his pistol again. Leon jammed the Glock in his hand under the man's chin then fired twice, and that was the end of it.

**A/N: Guys, let me know if I went a little overboard with the murdering. If it's too uhh... detailed, I'll change it a little so as not to seem like a psychopath. Also, in case you were wondering, I do love guns and other sorts of weapons. The Glock Leon's got his hands on is a Glock 18C (the "C" stands for compensated). The compensator is a slit cut into the end of the weapon that vents discharge gases in an upward direction to help control recoil.**

**Just in case you were wondering what the hell a compensator was.**


End file.
